Barry Bonds
 

I can't believe that no one is talking about Barry Bonds.

Anyway, I wish people would leave him alone. I never condone anyone for cheating and I'm not a huge Barry Bonds fan, but let the man do his job.

It's a different situation with Bonds than with any other player in history. Honestly, he has three major things going against him in public view:

1) When the grand jury testimony leaked, it basically showed that he had taken steroids. Now, there can be arguments of whether or not that was cheating (since it wasn't banned by MLB for a few years), but he's now branded as a cheater.

2) Bonds has NEVER had a good relationship with the media, even back to his early days in Pittsburgh. By translation, his relationship with fans has been sketchy at best; it's like he doesn't care what people think about him (although some people around him swear that fan reaction is very important to him). You're not even going to get the half-hearted apology that Giambi gave last season.

3) He's attacking a record that has been held by two of the most-beloved baseball players ever. Ruth, for all his faults, was loved by the nation. Hank Aaron garnered a ton of respect for the way he played, and what he faced (racism, death threats) on his way to breaking the record.

I don't think Bonds is going to last to break 755, but I can't imagine the amount of negative attention that will follow him if he does.

Re: Barry Bonds
 

If you want people to leave him alone, why did you start a thread for people to trash him???

Not all of us here are going to trash him. I absolutely think that he deserves every single record he breaks. He is being targeted because he is easy to point a finger towards and blame for the mess that MLB created. Why is it so inconceivable for Barry to have hit all those homeruns? Pujols is doing the same thing this year, with steroid testing in place. Assuming the testing is effective, that just goes to show that it is possible to smack around lots of homerun balls. For my sake, I do hope he reaches 755, cause then I would have seen the number eclipsed in my lifetime. Especially since I have endure both the Red Sox and White Sox winning a world series.

Pujols is 26 years old. He's at the top of his game. With testing in place, fans can be relatively assured that he's having an awesome season due to natural talent & not b/c of performance enhancing drugs.

I'm making the argument that hitting that many homeruns is a possibility. It doesn't take steroids to be able to hit 73 homeruns. Barry's records are legitimate any way they are seen. And if he was juiced, it was not illegal to use steroids at the time, and he has never tested positive. I remember Ken Caminiti won the 1996 MVP award and then admitted to career long steroid use. So they were around long before Bonds allegedly started. So Pujols is 26 years old, but his talent level doesn't nearly approach Bonds' talent level.

Pooh Holes is not 26. He is atleast 32. Don't believe his pinochio ass

So you're saying that cheating is cool as long as it's not technically illegal?

Cheating has been a part of baseball since its inception - do you think Gaylord Perry should be removed from the Hall of Fame? How about Ted Williams, who was known for being the greatest sign-stealer in history? It's part of the game, for better or worse - and most would say 'better' . . .

I know we want to draw fine lines here, but honestly without any sort of knowledge that steroids have a positive effect on hitting, that pitchers weren't also using actively, and without rules in place to actually invalidate the record, I feel like you're barking up the wrong tree.

Should we just forget the entire era 1970-2005 because of the use of amphetamines? They fall into EXACTLY the same category as steroids: not illegal by baseball rules, not allowed under federal drug laws, intended to better the ability to perform on an every-day basis . . .

Barry Bonds if from Riverside. Nothing good ever comes out of the IE.

I am saying according to baseball's rules and regulations it wasn't considered cheating until after the fact.

HAHAHAHAHA! And I had the audacity to buy a home here. Damn. I went from Long Beach to the 951. I suck. ;)

Re: Re: Barry Bonds
 

This thread is not to trash him. It's to talk about him, since no one brought him up.

Re: Re: Re: Barry Bonds
 

Ok, maybe it wasn't YOUR intention to trash him, but you know before this thread dies, there will be trashing.

They brought up the fact on the radio a couple weeks ago that when Babe Ruth was playing, he did all manner of illegal things, like drinking (illegal then) and a hooker here and there. Plus, remember that way back then, cocaine was still in Coca Cola and completely legal. Babe could have been having a Coke in the dugout and getting high at the same time. (Not that I think any of these arguments are really that good, just bringing them up to point out the illegal/legal part.)

The thing I don't understand is why people have been making a big deal about him beating Babe Ruth. Didn't Hank Aaron do that like 25 years ago?